Sulu sultanate to seek US help, cites 1915 agreement

From InterAksyon (Mar 2): Sulu sultanate to seek US help, cites 1915 agreement

The Sulu sultanate will seek the help of the United States to back up its claim to Sabah by invoking a 1915 agreement that, among others, assures the sultanate of American protection.

Abraham Idjirani, spokesman of the sultanate, said Friday that their council would write the US embassy in Manila and invoke the so-called Carpenter agreement signed on March 22, 1915 between Sultan Hadji Jamalul Kiram and Frank W. Carpenter, governor of the then Department of Mindanao and Sulu.

“We are seeking the intervention of the United States of America as stated in the Kiram-Carpenter argument of 1915” in which the Americans “assured the sultan of Sulu of (its) full protection should a problem arise in Sabah between the sultan of Sulu and other foreign countries,” Idjirani said.

“That’s the US historical and moral obligation to us,” he told InterAksyon.

Idjirani also said they plan to press their claim before the International Court of Justice.

At the same time, he stressed that Sultan Jamalul Kiram III is not demanding an increase in the token annual rental paid by Malaysia but the recognition of their claim to Sabah.

The Kiram family, he said, "don't want an increase on rental, it is not about money."

"Ayaw ng sultan na sila lang ang makinabang sa upa, gusto ng royal house of Kiram na lahat ng Pilipino ay mag-profit sa natural wealth ng North Borneo o Sabah (The sultan doesn’t want his family alone to benefit from the rent, the royal house of Kiram wants all Filipinos to profit from the natural wealth of North Borneo or Sabah)," he said.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/56176/sulu-sultanate-to-seek-us-help-cites-1915-agreement